


and so it seems

by debwalsh, Judeyjude



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Captain America Reverse Big Bang 2018, Dancing, Fluff, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, Reincarnation, Soulmates, includes several reincarnated lives of steve and bucky, the Cap era one is the canon story line, the Fates as minor characters, the ones pre-Cap era are non-power aus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 05:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14867412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/debwalsh/pseuds/debwalsh, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Judeyjude/pseuds/Judeyjude
Summary: She simply smiled, basking in the truth that she’d soon watch over her favorite two souls again. It had been many years since she last saw them. “I am careful. A little meddling never hurt anybody."They settled into a pleasant silence. She should claim a soul pod soon, she thought as she looked down at the lone soul in her arm, fussy and swirling.“It feels a bit wrong, doesn’t it?” He nodded his head to the soul. “Them being separated like this.”“They’ll be back together soon,” she said.-Or, Steve and Bucky dancing in each reincarnation + the one time they didn’t (but still found their way in the end)





	and so it seems

**Author's Note:**

> a huge thanks to debwalsh for the lovely art! None of this would have been inspired without her : )
> 
> I'm very excited to post my first MCU fic and I hope you all enjoy reading it!

The first thing that should have tipped the Fates off was little Steve Rogers’ fragility. Even before he could walk, there was a certain graceless quality to him. And as he grew, with his bad back and bad lungs and bad ear and bad heart, it became apparent he wasn’t fit for dancing long hours or making fast steps.

 

But young James Barnes lulled the Fates into a false sense of security. His bond with Steve was deeply anchored in love, even as children, and he soon became Steve’s _Bucky ._  Bucky had more than enough dance skills for the two of them. Every part of him read smoothly; he picked up everything with ease, rhythm ran deep in his bones, and he loved to garner a little—or a lot—of attention in some fashion of performing.

 

Surely, Bucky could pick up Steve’s slack in dancing. Steve, the Fates assured themselves, had a lithe form perfect for Bucky to easily pick up and flip. It was only a matter of time.

 

The Fates kept an idle eye on the two boys as they grew up, watching Bucky insistently ask Steve to follow him to the dance halls. Steve mostly refused, not a surprise in the least, carrying on his prickly legacy. When he did follow his other half, Steve lurked in the shadows and usually ended up in a sour mood, snapping at Bucky. Later, he liked watching from the corners, committing the image of swirling skirts in his mind to draw later. The Fates became used to Steve claiming to have two left feet in this lifetime because, well, it was true.

 

But it wasn’t until 1936 that the foreshadowing and haunting sentence spilled from Steve’s lips.

 

“Leave me alone, Buck. I can’t dance.”

 

_I can’t dance._

 

For the very first time, Steve Rogers admitted he couldn’t do something.

 

_I can’t dance._

 

Of all things, it had to be about dancing.

 

_I can’t dance._

 

The Fates were fucked.

 

* * *

 

Steve and Bucky weren’t always Steve and Bucky.

 

“I do _not_ want to go,” a boy, too young to be a man, declared. He twisted from the servant’s arms and scowled at the woman standing in his bedroom doorway. The servant let out a put-upon sigh, limply holding the pair of breeches she had tried to wrangle the boy into.

 

The woman from the doorway stepped in with a small smile adorning her face. Her hands fluttered around her hair briefly, not quite touching her head, making sure nothing was out of place. “I know, darling,” she said as she lowered her hands. The boy scrunched his nose at the endearment, both disgruntled and pleased. “No more fuss. Your father shall not hear for it and neither shall the Royal family.”

 

The boy wanted to point out that she wasn’t his mother—not his _real_ one—and neither was his “father”. They took him in years ago, but for as long as he held fuzzy memories of his grinning birth parents with dirt-smudged cheeks, these people he lived with would never truly be his own family.

 

He also wanted to snap that the Royal family cared not for people like them. The boy’s adoptive parents had high enough status for invitations to larger gatherings, but low enough to have no impactful presence in high society.

 

He certainly didn’t see why _his_ presence mattered. They never allowed him to attend before! Grinding his teeth together, he worked through several responses before admitting defeat and snatching the breeches from their servant. If he was old enough to attend some fancy party, he was damn well old enough to dress himself.

 

His not-mother smiled and left him to brood.

 

Hours later, shifting in his too-tight shoes, the young boy continued his brooding in the shadows of the Royal castle’s garden. He had escaped into the strangely shaped hedges and hoped to hide away until he’d hear his not-father’s whistle that meant _come quick, boy._

 

“Who are you?”

 

The young boy yelped at the whispered question. The gush of air exhaled from the three words ghosted the back of his ear. He spun around, coming nose-to-nose with another boy his age. “Don’t do that!”

 

The stranger grinned, looking extremely self-satisfied. The stranger stepped back and asked again, “Who are you?”

 

The boy glared at the stranger but it was more for the principal of it than true anger. He already softened, excitement building up at finding someone his age. All the kids in his village adored him—he was sure he could charm this stranger into playing with him.

 

“You came with Lord Rowley,” the stranger said before a name could be given.

 

“Well if you knew that, then why’d ya ask,” the boy sassed.

 

“I’m training, but I couldn’t figure you out but then you moved and now I can see your face. So, I didn’t know but now I know. Will you come to more parties?” The stranger spoke fast and started walking backwards, facing the boy and leading them further into the dimly lit garden. In the space between shadows, a moonbeam exposed the Royal crest on the stranger’s coat.

 

“You’re the Prince!”

 

The Prince stopped. “And?” There was a challenge to his tone, a hard edge that didn’t exist before.

 

The boy’s throat dried up. He didn’t know Princes liked sneaking up on and scaring their subjects, knew who everyone was before speaking with them, and skipped backwards while rambling. He had expected someone pompous and polite and perfectly boring. He certainly didn’t expect to see or even speak with the Prince, either.

 

Before he could flounder through some dumb response, the Prince pushed him, _hard._ Instinctively, the boy shoved the Prince with twice as much force, sending the Prince flying down onto his back. The boy gaped in horror as soon as the Prince fell down, his insides twisting up all cold and bitter as winter. Numbly, he watched the Prince bring up his hands, having used them to brace himself from the fall. Blood streaked his palms and little rocks were embedded into his pale skin.

 

The boy was dead. He was so very, _very_ dead. He hurt the Prince—shoved him! His father was going to kill him. Or a guard would. Or the Prince’s parents—the _King and Queen!_

 

The boy’s breaths came quicker and quicker, his mind spiraling.

 

The Prince declared, “I’m not a baby.”

 

The boy looked down at him. “W-what?”

 

The Prince sat up straighter and raised his bloody hands. “I’m not a baby. Don’t treat me like I’m fragile just because I’m...Royalty.” Still on the ground, the Prince jutted his chin out. “If I push you, you push me back, okay?”

 

“That was on purpose?” the boy asked. Apparently, he only spoke in questions now. He supposed if he ever were allowed stupidity, it should be overlooked when facing Royalty. Especially in front of this wild thing of a prince. A prince who wasn’t particularly frail, but behind his enormous bravado, looked weak and easy to take down in a fight.

 

The Prince scoffed. “Of course. And I fell on purpose, too.” The boy yelped as the Prince hooked his ankle around the boy’s and yanked the boy down onto his ass. “You couldn’t beat me if you tried.” The Prince grinned with sharp teeth.

 

The boy’s elbows stung, scrapped raw along with his ego on the pebbled path, but suddenly it didn’t matter who this kid was, prince or not. He sprung forward, tackling the Prince. They wrestled on the gravel, pushing into the pointy branches of the hedges; tough enough for fun but careful enough to not rip any clothing beyond repair.

 

Eventually, they both laid on their backs, their chests heaving, the Prince’s more so. The moon watched over them and they watched the stars.

 

“So,” the boy puffed out between breaths, amusement curling in every word, “do you do anything other than scare people and fight?”

 

A long pause stretched. “Well. I do like to dance.”

 

“Oh, really? I’m the best dancer in the village,” the boy bragged. “Probably in the whole Kingdom.”

 

The Prince sat up with a scowl, the soft moonlight showing off his flushed red skin. “We shall see about that.”

 

The boy wondered if everything was going to be like this with the Prince—a competition, a challenge. As years flew by, the boy learned that no other wondering of his had ever been truer than that one. He didn’t mind in the slightest. Never a dull moment was found between them, even the most mundane things turned into ridiculous fights.

 

The boy was lucky that the King and Queen took to him so fondly. When he and the Prince played games of _who-can-steal-more-food-off-the-other’s-plate-without-them-noticing,_ the Royal couple only chuckled and encouraged the two boys on. The Queen often took the boy’s side; the King to the Prince’s.

 

Lucky, too, was the boy that they never stopped the Prince and him from dancing. Under their approval and years of becoming acquainted with the sight of the two boys—and soon-to-be two men—dancing, no one in the kingdom questioned the anomaly. They even understood that when it came to the dance floor, the two turned down women in favor of each other.

 

In fact, at the Prince’s pre-coronation—he had announced that in six months he’d claim title as King, even without a Queen by his side—the whole ballroom held a collective giddy breath as the boy—now a man—and the Prince gracefully descended down staircases from opposite ends of the room.

 

The Prince bent a knee when they met in the middle, lowered his body, and extended a hand.

 

As the man graciously accepted the Prince’s offer, taking his hand, he quietly asked the same question from the night of their very first dance, his lips barely moving. “Care for a dance, my Prince?”

 

He wondered, hoped, that the Prince remembered that night, the blood of their palms smearing together and the innocent affection unfurling inside them, the beginnings of a sprout they didn’t understand as they made their first clumsy, but well-paced, steps together in the shadowed garden.

 

With one arm behind his back in formal posture, the Prince straightened up and released the man’s hand. As a young boy, the Prince had stubbornly answered, _As long as it is a dance, not one just for a prince._

 

The man then bowed in acknowledgment to the Prince’s status and the Prince spoke softly in return, his face deceivingly composed. “As long as it is a dance not for _a_ prince,” the Prince said, “but for _your_ prince.”

 

With formalities aside, the Prince splayed his right hand across the man’s lower back and the music began to swell. It was odd to have the Prince lead. They had practiced for the Prince to lead when dancing in public, but in private, more often than not, the man led. The years had taught them how to read each other and the man easily saw the Prince’s nerves at making such a bold statement. The Prince clutched the material of the man’s coat for a moment, like an aborted move to pull their bodies flush together.

 

Instead, the Prince simply shifted his hold to the man’s waist, a respectable space between them, and began leading them to the music, swaying and turning them both. He stepped aside, allowing his hand to drag across the man’s abdomen with the movement. Showing off in a spin, the man came back to the Prince, who cupped the other side of the man’s torso.

 

From there, like most things between them, things turned complicated. They danced a dance they made of their own, of multiple styles, switching fluidly between forms in perfect beat to the gentle music. The crowd _oohed_ and _awed_ —the man had heard the view of them dancing was just as breathing-taking as it felt. He didn’t believe them, of course. They could never know how euphoric and heart-racing this was.

 

The two men had matching flushes and matching mouths that twitched with the effort to contain matching split grins, and it was still a fight, a challenge as soon as the Prince had said _your prince_ , but for once they felt perfectly, evenly matched in a duel.

 

Neither cared for who was winning.

* * *

 

The strange thing about being a child of Fates was learning how non-linear time was. A Fates child birthed Namid, leaving her with her human father in the 1900s. Namid died young and the Fates snatched her up to her mother’s land where she began her rightful life as a child of Fates. Despite being born in 1902, her first assignment took place centuries before that and from there, she bounced through the eras.

 

A seed of bitterness still flourished within her at being taken from Earth, from her life as a dancer, even years later when she finished her assignment of helping to guide two souls into bodies she never knew would cross each other’s paths. That wasn’t her job to know and she was too early in her work line to have much intuition. Early enough, too, to still be interested in peeking in on the souls she helped guide, check up on how the souls’ bodies grew up.

 

It was then that she first saw these two souls come together and soothe that dark seed inside her that _ached_ with the loss of dancing. She watched and watched them grow and she grew attached to them like Fates children weren’t supposed to. She pondered if their souls had met before because the two boys intertwined as one when they danced so beautifully.

 

Time might be a silly and quaint concept, but it was a long, long while later when someone said, “Again, Namid?”

 

Namid looked up to her mentor’s disapproving gaze. Less of her mentor and more of her friend these days, long past the decades of teaching and being taught. Namid, wise with age but young with spirit—a precious danger—huffed. “Yes. There are no rules against so. I can do as I please over my domain.”

 

“Maybe not _rules_ , per se, but there is certainly a code of conduct followed unanimously. One you’ve broken again and again, and now,” Warren said, “again.”

 

Namid hummed a note of acknowledgement under her breath. Warren was a descendent from the Fates who handled death, while Namid came from spinning life. A fork in the road had separated them at some point as they settled deeper in their line of work, forcing them to each see the human world differently.

 

The weight of Warren’s gaze laid heavy upon her, but Namid felt no heat in it. Not that she expected anything more than a light scolding. She pushed these present thoughts away as she re-focused on her task.

 

It was not easy finding one specific soul, let alone two. Namid continued her search, determined and patient, sifting through the silvery mass of souls gliding over each other like a glimmering river. It was not easy coaxing souls away from the mass, separating them from the others. It was even less easy to guide a soul into a new life. And even more uneasy to guide two souls into lives that were destined to inevitably cross paths—a blurred line outside Namid’s duty that she dared to cross.

 

Sweat collected on Namid’s brow as she moved her body in slow dance-like movements, picturing in her mind how and where she wanted the set of souls to go. One easily took to a woman giving birth in the twentieth century, settling inside the mother’s newborn baby and giving its—his—first wail.

 

The second soul was less agreeable. A vision flashed in Namid’s mind, one that told her the second soul would only take to a mother who would go into labor a whole year and a few months from the first soul’s rebirth.

 

A whole year? Namid continued her ritual, swaying her arms and slowly turning her feet with persuasive steps. That was far too long. But the soul yielded her movements, resistant, and Namid knew when to admit defeat. The two souls would only interlink in this lifetime if the second soul returned to earth in a year, then and only then.

 

Body sagging, Namid cradled the resistant soul in one arm. She’d have to rest it in one of the pods like the other Fates used in circumstances such as this. Well, maybe not quite like this.

 

She opened her eyes, meeting Warren’s. He was sitting on a rock and shaking his head fondly at her.

 

“Will you ever tire of these two?”

 

Namid smiled wickedly in answer.

 

“You can’t find some other poor humans to watch dance?”

 

Carefully, Namid sat with the soul and tutted. “No one dances like they do.”

 

“I know, I know. All the Fates know! They’re adored—even though we shouldn’t know a pair of souls well enough to adore them.” A certain tension grew in Warren’s body.

 

Namid simply smiled, basking in the truth that she’d soon watch over her favorite two souls again. It had been many years since she last saw them. “I am careful. A little meddling never hurt anybody,” Warren sighed at her, “and they always dance so lovely and bring joy. They’ve never got in the way of the other Fates rulings. You enjoy looking over them, too.” She turned her head toward him.

 

The corners of Warren’s lips tipped upwards. “Of course,” he conceded like she had to the resistant soul. “Wait until the rumors spread that they’re back.”

 

They settled into a pleasant silence. Namid should claim a soul pod soon. She looked down at the soul in her arm, fussy and swirling.

 

“It feels a bit wrong, doesn’t it?” Warren nodded his head to the soul. “Them being separated like this.”

 

“They’ll be back together soon,” Namid said.

 

* * *

 

“How come ya sound like that?”

 

The towheaded boy wiped snot from his nose, dragging blood across his face thanks to his scuffed knuckles. “Like how,” he demanded, aggression still lingering in his tone and body.

 

A taller boy sat in the alleyway next to him, acting as if he liked sitting on the dirty ground. He had convinced the towheaded boy to sit next to him, worried about the boy’s wheezing breaths after the scuffle against the two teenagers. The smaller boy understood that he was being coddled, but at least he accepted it better than he had accepted help in the fight.

 

“Ya Irish?” The taller boy guessed at the accent. “Ya look Irish.”

 

“You look dumb,” the blond boy shot back. He paused and then held out his less bloody hand. “‘M Steve and if you got a problem with Irish folk then,” Steve continued the sentence in heavily accented Gaelic.

 

“Wow! Wha’s that mean? I’m Bucky.” Bucky took Steve’s hand and shook it earnestly.

 

“My Ma taught me but ’m not s’posed to say that. She taught me how to hit, too, but ’m not s’posed to do that, too.” Steve’s smile was sheepish and daring and full of mischief all at once.

 

Bucky liked him. “She really taught ya how to hit?”

 

Steve shrugged one bony shoulder and winced in pain. “Ya. I get in fights a lot. But she can’t stop me.” Steve puffed his chest out, which wasn’t much. “I know what’s I gotta do when somethin’ ain’t right. And yer s’posed ta keep yer thumb on the outside of yer fist, Ma says.”

 

Bucky slapped his knee. “Steve, ya gotta do better than just make a fist to fight!” He laughed. “Jesus, Mary...You’re stickin’ with me now, ya numbskull.”

 

“Oh yeah? Says who?”

 

“Says me. An’ I’m bein’ real nice even after ya called my face dumb,” Bucky said. He tipped his chin up, matching Steve’s defiant stare. After a minute, Steve broke and muttered, _fine._ He screwed his face up, sticking his tongue out at Bucky and, yeah—Bucky really liked this kid.

 

“C’mon,” Bucky stood and yanked Steve up with him, keeping an arm around the smaller boy’s shoulders, “we’re gonna get ice cream!”

 

Bucky had been humiliatingly gentle when helping Steve stand, but he had made up for the delicate treatment when he roughly yanked Steve under his arm, jostling them as they walked—Steve decided he really liked this boy. Even if he had stuck his nose in Steve’s fighting business.

 

As they made their last steps out of the alleyway together, Bucky stepped on a piece of paper that Steve had forgotten about. “What’s this?” Bucky released Steve to pick it up. “This is real neat. Wow!”

 

Steve snatched the paper. It must have fallen out from where Steve had tucked it into the loose waist of his pants during the fight, before Bucky came to help him. “Shut up,” he mumbled at the praise, ears pink. “Just a drawing of Ma an’ Pa dancing.” It was a silly imagination; his Pa died in war and Steve had never seen him dance. “‘S nothin’.”

 

“I like dancin’,” Bucky said.

 

Steve shrugged and shoved the paper away, not caring about the bad drawing or dancing.

 

None of that mattered when he made his very first friend.

 

* * *

 

Most children of Fates took offense to others watching over their process. If your work somehow started life, you did so and moved on. If you determined the length of a human’s life, that’s what you did. If you chose how a human died, you did so. But you did your one part for that human and you moved on to the next. You didn’t check to see how the human came to the world before your work and you didn’t keep watching the human after you completed your part. Only newcomers adjusting to their new life as a Fates child were excused for peeking in on the process of someone’s work.

 

Namid never had trouble veering out of her work. Even when she pulled her two favorite souls together and watched over them, she didn’t pester or look to who took over them once she guided their souls back into human bodies.

 

The Fates accepted their return as Steve and Bucky, not inquiring to who worked next on the two boys’ lifetimes. They watched alongside Namid, their curiosity always piqued. The two souls always danced for as long as they became infamous to the Fates. Danced soon after meeting and danced wonderfully. Fates were taught no soul was the same from one lifetime to the next, but these two?

 

They never strayed from their reputation.

 

* * *

 

“They’re yer little ones?”

 

Arnold nodded, mopping the sweat off his forehead in the sweltering summer heat. “The one with the stick is my Pa’s acciden’ kid and the other is our stray.”

 

Elisa, new to town, regarded the second child, who pulled dead grass and blabbered to the first. “He lives with ya?”

 

“Nah, but he might as well. Gotta watch him when his Ma’s at work. Or he ‘n my brother will tear up the town.” Arnold paused, considering for a moment. “Or end up dead.”

 

Elisa laughed, even if she took Arnold for his word. She’d heard many things around town about these two little ones—their reputation far-reaching and wild despite practically being babies. They appeared harmless now. Arn’s brother whacked a wash bin with a stick, smiling up to Arn with a gummy smile, as if the noise he was making was sweet music. His friend pushed around the plucked grass, maybe creating an image of sorts. He tugged on Arn’s brother’s pants, who stopped his banging to peer down at the grass. He grinned up at his friend.

 

It was tooth-achingly cute.

 

And then in a matter of seconds, the two were making a break for the road, shoving at each other in a race.

 

“Hey!” Arn grabbed the back of the kids’ shirt collars with a practiced ease. “Inside,” he ordered.

 

The boys struggled in Arn’s hold, griping loudly at Arn and then at each other and then at the world. They slumped, releasing all the tension in their bodies so that they hung from Arn’s hold. The sudden dead weight caused Arn to drop them but before they could take advantage of that, Arn smacked the boys’ heads toward the house. “Inside,” he repeated, more lazily this time.

 

With an air of dramatics, the kids marched, pulling their knees up high as they made their way in. Arn had been keeping Elisa out in the yard and she realized it had been purposeful. Their home looked fairly cleaned up from the outside, but the inside told the harsher story of their poverty.

 

“It’s real sweet of you to watch ‘em,” Elisa said.

 

Arn crossed his arms. “S’nothin’. I owe ‘em for music nights.” At Elisa’s look, Arn gestured to the children. “They draw in the crowds for me ‘n the boys.”

 

The kids had switched back into cute again, having pulled two cushions together on the floor. Arn’s brother claimed the right one and his brother’s friend claimed the left.

 

“Are they...dancing?”

 

The two boys, surprisingly in sync, used the cushions for an extra bounce to their steps. They grabbed right hand to the other’s right hand, pulled each other forward to jump across and switch cushions, letting go of their right hands and then clasping their left hands together and repeating the move, jumping back to their original cushions. No instrumental music played, but bugs chittered and buzzed, wind chimes twinkled softly from nonexistent summer wind, birds chirped sharp and low, and muffled voices from the neighborhood came together soothingly. Before it had all been noise, most of it ignored and blocked out. Now, it seemed silly to not see how the day was filled with its own fluid music.

 

“Yep,” Arn said, a special smile Elisa hadn’t seen before brightening his face. Elisa didn’t doubt that Arn was a skilled banjo player, but she understood at once why someone in town mentioned she _needed_ to visit on music nights.

 

The boys squatted their chubby legs and raised their hands up, shaking them with pure glee, smiles wide and friendly and inspiring in how childishly innocent they were.

 

* * *

 

The two souls didn’t dance in Steve and Bucky’s lifetime. Not with each other. Steve, not at all.

 

* * *

 

Let it be known that despite her faults, Namid was not the first of the Fates to make a mistake. Far back in history, there was a time when a Fates child found a loophole to help humans do most of the work for her, alievating her from her orchestrating duties.

 

The loophole worked suspiciously well until it didn’t. It was a horrid mess fixing it up, slowly erasing the loophole out of humanity until it became something of a myth. There were conspiracists in the modern age, and outcasted historians, too, who believed that such a magic once existed. No concrete evidence was left behind, however, washed away by time and humanity’s easy acceptance of the weird being impossible. Only the merest echo of it remained in couples who tattooed each other’s names or special meanings to their skin as an act of love—maybe not true love, but love all the same.

 

A dusty old poster existed somewhere in Virginia. The immortalized trapeze performers, hands reaching for each other, had been packed away in a box for decades by a descendent of the poster’s original owner. The Virginian woman couldn’t find it in herself to throw it away, not when her ancestors kept it around for so long. The only thing that bothered her about it were the words painted unrealistically clear over the brunette trapeze performer’s arm. The words did nothing to help with advertising the show and looked rather crude compared to the rest of the realistically drawn picture.

 

She chalked it up to some poor marketing technique to distract the viewer from the second trapeze performer of the pair, who looked fragile enough to be long dead before you even made it to the show.

 

_“Cub, wake up!” A lanky young man pinched the earlobe of a dark-haired boy sleeping dangerously close to a cage of tigers._

 

_The sleeping boy, Cub_ , _blinked himself awake, as if ear-pinching was a peaceful way to wake up. He gave the lanky man a sleepy smile and sat up from his slouching position against the wall. Cub hummed appreciatively as he drank in the sight before him, at the new costume showing off his partner’s long legs. “Fancy a dance, my Lion-Man?”_

 

_Lion’s face scrunched up for a second, more for show than for real hesitance. When Cub held out a hand, Lion took it, yelping when Cub yanked him so their bodies clashed flush together with a soft_ thump _. Lion made a move to smack Cub but Cub simply cackled softly and caught Lion’s hand, intertwining their fingers._

 

_“Ass,” Lion muttered._

 

_“My ass is spectacular, yeah.”_

 

_Slipping one of his hands from Cub’s hold, Lion pinched Cub’s butt, earning another laugh from Cub. Cheer came easily to him, joy fitting him as snugly as his performing costume. It was one of the many reasons he had been nicknamed Cub, much like the energetic newborn baby tiger he grew up with at the circus. Lion, or Lion-Man to everyone but Cub, got his name from his ferocity. Though he had grown several inches in the past years, he made a lasting impression as the tiny frail man he was when he first joined, burning from the inside out with a temper that could fill up a room. He may have looked more physically like a baby cub, or a runt, than Cub did, but he was a lion in every other right, his voice a deep roar._

 

_Perhaps the name Tiger would have been a better fit to pair him with Cub’s affinity for the big striped cats. But Cub loved Lion-Man as just Lion, loved how golden angel hair framed Lion’s face like a blond mane._

 

_Attempting to flatten Lion’s wild hair with his free hand, Cub tsked. “What has you all worked up, darling? You run your hands through your hair any more and you’re gonna go bald.”_

 

_“You keep sleeping with the tigers and one day they’ll eat you right up,” Lion shot back._

 

_“You saying I’m pretty enough to eat?” A smile curled up Cub’s lips as he repositioned their hands so they could sway in a simple dance, one easy enough that they could do it in their sleep. The tension sapped from Lion’s shoulders, quieting whatever idea was kicking up a storm in his head. Cub rested his head on top of Lion’s, satisfied and smug with pride for how well he took care of his Lion._

 

_“New costume?”_

 

_“No, I decided to dress half-naked for my entertainment.” Cub spun Lion spontaneously and Lion let out a surprised laugh. Cub mumbled something about_ very entertaining. _“They want my Words to be shown off more.”_

 

_“Don’t glare at me!” Cub defended. “I said the words, I didn’t choose the placing.”_

 

_“I don’t see why people need to see it, anyway. We’ve worked hard to be good at our actual jobs and we’re damn good at it, too.”_

 

_“Damn right we are.” Cub’s smile turned wicked and their pace quickened, steps changing. “And we’re even better dancers.”_

 

_“No one wants to watch us_ dance _, Cubby.”_

 

_“But anyone will pay to see a Marked pair.”_

 

_Lion fell silent, letting his restlessness slip away fully as he matched Cub’s lead. When his long bangs plastered with sweat to his forehead, he asked, “Have you seen the new posters?”_

 

_“Ours are hilarious. They wrote my Words on the wrong arm.”_

 

_“It’s a wonder that people assume we’re fakes,” Lion stated dryly._

 

_Their story drew in a fair part of the crowds—one of the last fabled Marked pairs. No one truly believed in soulmates anymore, disregarding tales passed down from their ancestors. But people also couldn’t resist the intrigue of the soulmate myth, of the few scant pairs that existed. It wasn’t uncommon that others faked Words—many circuses stole Lion and Cubs’ “act” and re-drew words on their skin every performance._

 

_“Never a fake,” Cub said, a touch harsh. He slowed them to a stop, letting go of Lion’s right hand._

 

_Cub traced the words that bloomed over Lion’s skin, trailing his finger from collarbone to collarbone, stepping to the side to continue tracing the path over Lion’s shoulder and down his back, exposed by the new costume. Lion shuddered and Cub pulled back, smiling as he pressed a kiss to Lion’s neck. “I look at your words on my skin every day and remember.”_

 

_“Romantic,” Lion grumbled, but he said it good-natured and warm and loving and pleased. Taking Cub’s arm, the one not seen in the poster, Lion turned it to show the words scribbled from Cub’s wrist to elbow. Lion pressed his own soft kiss there._

 

_Cub’s Mark was far, far shorter than Lion’s. Cub had been the one to speak first, nearly stumbling over his feet to approach the newest addition to the circus crew. Lion would never forget the alarmingly calm wave that passed through him when he spotted the famous trapeze performer, that one that went by a ridiculous nickname and would soon be his trapeze partner. A sense of rightness overcame him instead of panic._

 

“Please, will—golly, you’re beautiful—sorry, I mean, will you—do you, um, would you like to, with me, fancy a, uh, a—”

 

“—a dance? I suppose I can take on a cub.”

 

_It fit them, not only to be proclaimed soulmates by the Gods, but to have even their Marks completing each other. A long dash ended the trail of words on Lion’s back and a long dash began the words on Cub’s forearm. A question incomplete without the other._

 

_Lion remembered dancing in that muggy bar, the moment when Cub spun him away and Lion followed his moves without ever having to think, moving away with a flourish in one moment and flying back to Cub in the next, his back pressed tight to Cub’s chest, wrapped safe in his arms._

 

_The circus had taken a chance in hiring Lion but as the cast watched them dance, gob-smacked, they knew if the two men could perform with half as much chemistry and skill as they did when dancing, no one would have a single regret._

 

_Well, there was one regret—being privy to Cub’s neverending whining that Lion-Man should go forever shirtless. Everyone appreciated Lion smacking the back of Cub’s head in response—just seeing the look Cub got when Lion’s collar slipped and exposed the word_ beautiful _in Cub’s slanted handwriting was more than the company could handle._

 

_Lion pulled his lips back from Cub’s arm. His scrawly words on Cub’s skin were shown off every day in the warm season with Cub’s habit of rolling his sleeves up. A small swell of pride bloomed in Lion’s chest every time he saw it but he never got as obsessive as Cub did with his words on Lion’s skin._

 

_Lion laughed softly and explained to Cub’s perplexed expression, “Wait until the other’s see my new costume. You will be unbearable.”_

 

_A possessive and familiar gleam overcame Cub’s pretty eyes. He ran his hand over and down Lion’s Mark again. “I like this new marketing idea more and more.”_

 

_“Only you, Cubby.”_

 

_Cub took Lion’s earlobe between his teeth, scraping the skin lightly and releasing, reveling in the shiver it caused. “Now, are you going to keep teasing me or you going to really show me how to dance, Lion-Man?”_

 

* * *

 

None of the Fates said anything when Steve turned Bucky away on his night before deployment, leaving his other half with the two girls in favor of trying to re-enlist.

 

Fates didn’t always know what would happen, but they had intuition. Steve would die come winter from illness without Bucky and Bucky would die across the sea like many other soldiers without Steve.

 

The Fates knew this night was their last chance to dance. They knew, they watched as nothing happened, and they said nothing.

 

* * *

 

Steve, by some chance, weaseled his way into training.

 

* * *

 

“This wasn’t supposed to happen,” two Fates quietly said to Namid after Erskine's serum worked.

 

* * *

 

“So ya can’t dance? Frankie!” The short man yelled in Steve’s face, spit flying. “What am I supposed to do with this?” He gestured to Steve. “The fucking thing can’t dance!”

 

“Can he sing?”

 

The short man glared at Steve. “Can you?”

 

“Uh, maybe? I think—yes, yes, yeah, I can,” Steve hurried to say. The serum might have helped with singing but that wasn’t exactly one of the first things he had tried in this new body. He'd say anything to get this guy to shut up.

 

“Well, there you go,” Frankie yelled from behind a curtain. “Leave the dancin’ up to the gals.”

 

* * *

 

“This wasn’t supposed to happen,” two Fates quietly said to Namid after Bucky stumbled out of the laboratory under Steve’s arm.

 

* * *

 

Bucky grunted at Steve. “Fuck, Steve. I’m the one dyin’ here, but you’re the one who can’t even walk in a straight line.”

 

It wasn’t true. Bucky wobbled every third step but Steve didn’t dare try to support him again. The walk from the blown-up factory back to camp was a long one, though, and Steve would patiently wait for the moment Bucky’s exhaustion overpowered his pride. Then he’d swoop in. Maybe he could convince Bucky to get a ride on a tank.

 

So caught up in his head, Steve stumbled over a rock and nearly face planted. Bucky let out the barest of breaths, an almost chuckle.

 

“Y’know me, Buck,” Steve said with a half-shrug. “Two left feet.”

 

The small, small smile Bucky gave Steve was genuine and some tension seeped from his shoulders. “You’re hopeless, Rogers. Ain’t no serum ever gonna fix that.”

 

* * *

 

Here was the truth—Steve and Bucky’s souls hadn’t been ready to return to Earth. It wasn’t the time, it was too soon, it was too much of a stretch.

 

Bucky was supposed to die in Azzano. It was the years of life a child of Fates had felt for him and it was where another child of Fates had determined his death to be.

 

A month later, Steve’s due date was supposed to come.

 

Like with dancing, none of that happened.

 

* * *

 

There was a lot to be said—anxious, accusing, regretful, panicked—but no children of Fates spoke when Peggy said she might even dance after the war and Steve looked like he’d love nothing more than that and Bucky watched it all before him.

 

_“The right partner.”_

 

* * *

 

“Follow me!”

 

“Where are we goin’?” A buck-toothed boy chased after one of the other village kids into the fields.

 

“I am tired of dancing with your sisters.”

 

“So, what? You wanna dance with the maize?”

 

“Be quiet. And yes. Hide out here with me—stop laughing! We can hear them singing still, and...don’t you want to dance with me? You looked bored with the village girls.”

 

“You know you’re my favorite dance partner.”

 

“And you’re mine. Now shut your mouth and dance with me.”

 

“You’re a real gentlemen, you know that?”

 

“Only for you. And for the corn.”

 

* * *

 

The Fates weren’t so quiet after Steve rounded up his men for war.

 

“They’re saving people’s lives! I don’t understand,” Namid said.

 

“Death is death. There’s nothing cruel about it,” Warren said simply, pacing in a tight circle. “And they’re not just keeping people alive who were meant to die, they’re killing people who weren’t supposed to die yet. You’re— _they_ are messing up everyone’s timelines.”

 

“That’s an exaggeration.” Namid scoffed weakly. “It’s not everyone.”

 

“Do you know how many Fates jobs have fallen through? Do you know how many human’s lives this has screwed over? This is bad. This is really bad. And the other Fates aren’t happy.”

 

“How can this be worse than the time with the Marks and the Words and soulmates? It’s a blip and it’s...everything will fix over.”

 

Warren waited a long pause. “Tell me,” he said, stopping his pacing, “tell me you’d be okay if they died today.”

 

“It’s—I—this isn’t my job! I did my work and it’s not my fault they—”

 

“But you shouldn’t have done it in the first place! It wasn’t your job! This isn’t just two harmless kids dancing in a cornfield,” Warren snapped. “These are two souls _trapped_.”

 

“I’m sure,” Namid began hopelessly.

 

Warren cut her off. “No. No.” He grew silent and she didn’t dare interrupt it. “We should have known an omen. We all knew. We saw.” He nodded his head slowly, to himself. “ _‘I can’t dance’,_ ” he said softly.

 

* * *

 

Bucky plummeted down from the train.

 

He didn’t die.

 

* * *

 

Steve dove a plane in the ice.

 

* * *

 

Seventy years passed and silence followed. Fates worked their way around the few mistakes caused by Bucky’s survival—too solemn now to kick up a fuss about it.

 

* * *

 

Steve woke up.

 

* * *

 

Interferences stopped happening. Bucky was kept on the ice and Steve, in this new century, was somehow not getting in the way of how and when Fates chose for people to die.

 

Fates might have forgotten them, the dancer souls that went wrong, if it weren’t for the fact that Steve and Bucky had gone past their expiration and no one seemed able to fix it.

 

It felt wrong. How they never danced. How they were separated. How their souls didn’t reincarnate into a new century but still changed. Their souls seemed thinner, fragile. The type of souls that Fates were wary and careful of prodding after death.

 

* * *

 

Steve and Bucky met again and Fates watched and pretended to not watch as they fought, hands and knives and shield and gun and metal arm.

 

It was horrible and entrancing and gritty and a complicated violent dance.

 

It was dancing—it was, it was and it wasn’t. It was intricate steps and fluid reaction to action and intimate and well-matched and—

 

* * *

 

Steve struggled to stand. The enhanced boy had hit him, but his witchy sister did something else to him. The pain exploding from where his head hit the stair railing already began receding and Steve needed to get up, he needed to tell the...he had just been...coms...warn…

 

“Steve,” Bucky said. Music filtered in the room, slowly infiltrating in the background and quickly surrounding Steve like intoxicating fumes.

 

“Where…” Steve trailed off, not knowing what to say and shocked at the sound of his own voice, younger and higher-pitched. His eyes darted around the room, first searching for exits but the paranoia faltered as his eyes lingered over his Ma’s apartment.

 

Right. Right, of course, he was in his Ma’s apartment. Of course he was. Where else would he be?

 

That was _real_ Brooklyn out the apartment window— _why would he expect a fake Brooklyn to be there?_ —and Bucky was here waiting for him— _why wouldn’t Bucky be waiting for him?_

 

“Steve,” Bucky said again and Steve remembered. He remembered this moment, back in ‘33. He and Bucky were going dancing tonight. Except Steve would sulk and not admit to his nerves about having two left feet and he and Bucky would snipe at each other about it and Steve would be too proud and too jealous to step on the dance floor and he’d end up in a fight in the alley and Bucky would save him and they’d fight after and curl up asleep on couch cushions.

 

Bucky smiled too indulgently. The music didn’t crackle, didn’t sound muted in the way Steve knew it was compared to the future’s sound systems.

 

The future—

 

_War, bullets, mud, ice_ —

 

“Steve,” Bucky repeated. And it sounded so nice hearing his name roll off Bucky’s tongue, that thick Brooklyn accent. “Let me show ya how to dance, ya punk.”

 

Steve opened his mouth to—to say so many things, to ask so many things. How did he know how this night would end and why did he know that this moment wasn’t supposed to happen. “I don’t know,” came out of Steve’s mouth instead. Young and soft.

 

Bucky’s face softened. Steve realized like a punch to the gut that he _craved_ that expression, longed for it his whole life, but never allowed Bucky to look at him like that. A look too close to pitying for Steve to have handled.

 

But, God, does Steve allow it now.

 

“C’mere,” Bucky said and Steve did, walking forward. When he reached Bucky, he had to stretch his neck up to see Bucky’s eyes. He didn’t feel envious of Bucky’s height and lean muscle. Everything felt right. This slight body was Steve’s body and that was Bucky’s and everything felt at home. Cobwebs stuck in Steve’s eyes had been wiped away. “Step on my feet,” Bucky instructed.

 

“Buck,” Steve found himself whining but Bucky quelled him with a _look_ and it actually worked. Carefully, Steve stepped on Bucky’s feet. The absence of embarrassment was off-putting.

 

“You’re gonna be steppin’ on ‘em anyway,” Bucky said and Steve let go of Bucky’s right shoulder to sock him in the jaw, playfully. They both laughed and the music grew louder, changing to a slower beat.

 

“This isn’t Lindy,” Steve pointed out uselessly. He waited for Bucky to laugh and tease but he didn’t.

 

“Nope,” Bucky agreed. “Foxtrot.”

 

“How’m I supposed to dance if ya teach me to be the dame?” Steve leaned back to squint at Bucky. They still weren’t dancing, Steve’s feet firmly planted on Bucky’s and his hand on Bucky’s shoulder. Bucky cupped Steve’s other hand and wrapped his arm around Steve’s slim waist. His hand splayed protectively over Steve’s lower back, his grip firm and comforting. Soft and warm.

 

 

It was how Steve viewed the past—soft and warm. He didn’t know what that thought meant— _how could he view the past even while he was living it?_ And the past—it wasn’t warm and soft. It had hard and bitter edges. Good and right, but still tough and chewy. Steve had forgotten the _itch_. The feeling that this life could be better if he did something.

 

Steve remembered that itch, now, but he didn’t feel it. It should be here, he knew it should be, but there was so much relief in its absence.

 

These weird thoughts fumbled through Steve’s brain. A fear piercing through him like a bullet— _how did he know what a bullet felt like?_ —that he’d never feel right in his body, that home would never feel like home. Regret clouded his mind like denying the likelihood of pneumonia in winter; trying to convince himself that he didn’t ruin his past by being too stubborn, that he could have had more, could’ve been happier if he had let go of all his insecurities.

 

Terrified that he’d wasted his one chance to ever feel this right, a chance that would never come again.

 

“Bucky,” Steve croaked. He wanted to say he was scared and confused and wanted his Ma and he wanted to be home. But he said, “It’s so cold. Are you cold? Why is it cold?”

 

The music had seamlessly switched into a wind rising to a roar and the Brooklyn outside the window looked muted, almost fake, the curtains billowing. Bucky’s left hand in Steve’s felt cold and unfamiliar and—

 

Steve was on the Quinjet. In 2015. In a body that felt like a costume with a voice that was deep and tired. No music played. It wasn’t warm or soft.

 

He knew how to dance even less now than he did before.

 

* * *

 

“I don’t know what to do.” Bucky watched Steve from his peripheral vision. He sat on Steve’s bed, no remorse for waking Steve up at 4 a.m. He knew Steve hadn’t been truly sleeping, anyway, because Bucky somehow knew things like this and he knew Steve understood what Bucky meant because Steve somehow knew things like this.

 

Bucky had come to Steve one week, two days, and thirteen hours ago. He was fine and he wasn’t but he was trying and most days he didn’t miss the 1930s something awful. 2016 could be okay enough, with Steve, Bucky thought.

 

“Well.” Steve sighed. He did that a lot these days. Bucky didn’t remember him doing that so much in the past, at least not so sincerely and weary. “What...what makes you happy?”

 

Bucky chewed on his lip. The clock’s second hand ticking nagged at him; it was why he avoided Steve’s room so much. He probably should tell Steve he hated that clock and not Steve, but he wasn’t real good with words.

 

He curled up at the bottom of the bed, listening to the rustle of sheets as Steve lied back down. They half-dozed together, Steve’s foot touching Bucky’s shoulder, the blanket and Bucky’s shirt a thin barrier between them.

 

At 6:43, Bucky said, “I like to dance.”

 

“There you go.” Steve, his voice hoarse and cracking, didn’t have the same filter in the morning as he did during the day, his tongue loose when saying, “Some things never change.”

 

Bucky didn’t mind the comparison to the past, not today. Besides, Steve deserved some slack. Bucky wasn’t tactful at keeping his mouth shut on all the differences with who Steve was now, but Steve liked to keep those thoughts about past-Bucky to himself. “You didn’t,” Bucky said. “Like to dance. Yeah?”

 

“I can’t.”

 

Bucky mulled the sentence over. “You know what you can do?”

 

“What?”

 

“Make breakfast.”

 

Steve chuckled. “Alright, you lazy shit.”

 

* * *

 

You weren’t supposed to look in on the souls you dealt with. You did your part in fate again and again and again, seamlessly working with other children of Fates. Life was life, death was death, a soul was a soul. You were supposed to have a general attachment to humanity, but never let it get down to specifics.

 

Many took offense when you looked over their work, continued caring for a human long after you did your purpose. Fates excused the young ones who did so. The one other exception was for the old souls, the ones nearing the end.

 

A child of Fates guided souls into bodies and guided them back out once their bodies died. It was a cycle but not an endless one. No time limits existed, but souls knew things that even the Fates couldn’t know about them. Fates guessed their best on when a soul entered a human body for its very last time, and other Fates tried to keep track of the waning ones, to be mindful if it came to them to handle.

 

* * *

 

“How was Zumba?”

 

Bucky scrunched his face up, not responding. Steve huffed, amused and exasperated. He put away the sixth and final box of sugary cereal and closed the kitchen cabinet, saying, “Sorry. Tango? Ballroom?”

 

“Yoga,” Bucky corrected. He yanked his scrunchie out, laughing at Steve’s wince—Steve didn’t understand how that didn’t hurt. The sweaty strands toppled down and Steve laughed in turn, holding onto the counter as Bucky stupidly blew out huge puffs of air, trying to blow a massive chunk of hair out of his face.

 

“Shut up,” Bucky grumbled, spitting out a strand of hair. He snatched the glass of water Steve had set out for him earlier and stalked off to the shower.

 

Later, Steve smiled at Bucky’s flushed cheeks—they both liked their showers unusually hot—and fluffed hair, gently towel dried, like the internet suggested for better hair. (Steve had looked at Bucky’s, extremely hair-related, Google search history). (To be fair, Bucky had done the same to Steve beforehand and made fun of the search ‘what gay colors’). (Which just proved how technologically advanced Steve was, thank you very much, because he knew Google only needed three words to understand. He just wanted the bisexual flag colors, so fuck you, Bucky).

 

“No dancing today?”

 

Bucky leaned back into the couch cushions, sticking a leg up on their coffee table. He shook his head. Steve switched from sketching their bookcase to outlining the shape of Bucky’s eyes.

 

“You should come with me sometime.”

 

“I don’t like yoga that much.” Steve wiped his thumb across the paper, smudging graphite under Bucky’s eyes. “Nat dragged me to a class a few years ago.”

 

“Not yoga, you dumbass. I’d pay to see that, though.” Bucky bit his lip. Steve had mindlessly drawn Bucky’s lips to detailed perfection, chapped skin and quickly healing scabs from biting before Bucky spoke again. “I figure I can pick you up and swing ya, but no way can I slide you between my legs.”

 

Steve snickered. “Not with those thighs.”

 

“Hey! You like these thighs. It’s more like your stupid shoulders.”

 

“You like my stupid shoulders,” Steve mocked back.

 

“I’m serious. You should come to a class. It’s a real workout. I won’t even make you do any of that fancy stuff.”

 

“That’s a lie and you know it.” Steve had seen his fair share of dames gone starry-eyed after they blindly followed through some crazy move Bucky led them through. Bucky grinned coyly at Steve.

 

“You only like working out if you can punch things,” Bucky accused.

 

“I run!”

 

Bucky pointed a finger at Steve. “You mean punching birdbrain’s ego?” Bucky shrugged and said good-naturedly, “Whatever. Your loss.”

 

An abrupt image of the vision Wanda had put in Steve’s head years ago reared its ugly—and beautiful—head. Standing on Bucky’s toes, remembering that _itch_ , the warmth and then sudden cool of Bucky’s hand, young and—

 

“Hey. Where’d you go?”

 

Swallowing, Steve shook his head slightly, refocusing. Bucky cupped Steve’s elbow, his eyes worried and searching Steve’s face. He caught Steve the most out of anyone—if anyone actually noticed—when Steve checked out into that thousand-yard stare.

 

“Nowhere,” Steve said. A dense ball of guilt settled in his gut, knowing Bucky must think Steve had a flashback to some gruesome battlefield. “Let’s, uh, what movie are we watching tonight?”

 

 

* * *

 

Namid had been wise, but young with spirit.

 

Now she was just wise. There had been many souls since Steve and Bucky. She didn’t watch over those ones. She didn’t mind.

 

Secretly, she never believed what she had done was wrong. She thought that no matter what, no matter when, that those two souls would go out with a bang, would find a way to make their time together last longer on their very last human life.

 

Most Fates thought she pushed them to their end earlier. That Steve and Bucky’s souls broke when the bodies they resided in were injected with serum. Their souls trapped, having to figure out how to reincarnate themselves while still inside a human body, destroying most of their soul in the energy used without the Fates help.

 

Namid still peeked in on the two souls. Steve and Bucky. She didn’t know how their destiny would play out. If their souls would gently go in death. She wondered if the two would weakly intertwine together upon their end, creating one soul ready to go through life one more time.

 

She thought herself to be wise, and she thought in the end, those two souls would find their peaceful way together.

 

* * *

 

“Bucky?”

 

Bucky grunted, scrubbing the scruffy part of the sponge on Nat’s surprisingly dirty dinner plate. Nat, Sam, Sharon, and Clint left a little less than an hour ago and Bucky was left equal parts drained and warm. Warm like running on the fumes of bubbly champagne—it had been a good day.

 

Speaking of warm and bubbly, Bucky dunked the dish into the soapy water and turned the faucet on to rinse.

 

“Bucky,” Steve repeated, louder and Bucky’s tongue readily formed around the beginnings of a snapping tease—but his ears caught on the low music playing the background. It had changed from their usual Thursday Night Playlist.

 

“Bucky,” Steve said again, patient enough to get Bucky suspicious. Setting the plate down, Bucky wiped his hands front and back on his pants before turning around.

 

“Steve,” Bucky said, a smile threatening to cross the corners of his lips, “what?”

 

Steve stood in their living room, the coffee table pushed away, and extended his right arm, his palm open and inviting. “Bucky,” Steve said, a little petulant whine coming out.

 

Bucky leaned against the counter, cocking his head innocently. “Yes?” He bit the inside of his cheek as Steve huffed, his cheeks coloring a pretty pink. Bucky sensed Steve’s excessive anxiety but up until now, he had given a good go at trying for nonchalance.

 

Something clicked in Steve’s tightly closed left hand and the music stopped and restarted.

 

_Here’s my story, it’s sad but true…_

 

Bucky raised his eyebrows when the tune turned more upbeat. “Is this a doo-wop?”

 

“Kinda modernized? I mean, it’s from the 60’s so not modern—Bucky, just, come dance with me, alright?”

 

The grin Bucky had held back sprung forward, wide enough to hurt. Clear relief flooded Steve’s face—Bucky’s stomach flipped at how important this was to Steve—but Steve’s expression quickly changed to cautious as Bucky sauntered forth.

 

He took Steve’s offered hand, pulling Steve forward with a jolt and moving him into a spin under Bucky’s arm. He took a moment to appreciate the dumb, surprised look on Steve’s face and then took a moment to savor Steve’s outrage as Bucky held up the music clicker. He had nicked it from Steve’s other hand during the spin.

 

“Bucky!”

 

“If we’re gonna do this,” Bucky clicked the pause button, “then we’re gonna do this right. Get the record player.”

 

“Bucky!” Steve planted his hands on his hips, going into full Small Steve. Commonly mistaken as Captain America Mode, but anyone who thought that was a dumbass—this scolding was clearly reverting back to Steve’s dumbass roots as a tiny dumbass punk filled to the brim with dumbass anger. “That’s your birthday present. Stop snooping in my side of the closet! Goddammit.”

 

“And I love it, thanks. I bought a bunch o’ records for it,” Steve made a strangled sound and Bucky shooed him, “so go get it.”

 

While Steve retrieved the record player, grumbling, Bucky pressed the clicker’s play button, then the rewind button, and raised their speaker volume up. He tossed the remote onto the couch and enjoyed this music for now, snapping his fingers along to the clapping as he walked toward and down the hallway to retrieve the secret hoard of records he’d been collecting.

 

“‘S nice song,” Bucky remarked from the couch— _I fell in love and my love still grows_ _—_ when they returned to the living room. Steve snorted— _keep away from a Runaround Sue—_ plugging the record player in. It was nice, the record player. Old-timey looking but not replicated to its true form—modern touches betraying its antique look.

 

“I had a whole playlist planned,” Steve said. “But I shoulda known you’d be as controllin’ with music as you are with dancing.”

 

Bucky grinned, hip-checking Steve out of the way so he could get to doing his work. He wondered if his Brooklyn accent came through thicker like Steve’s was beginning to. He hoped if he got Steve real nostalgic, a little Irish lilt would come in. “So what kinda moves are ya gonna use to sweep me off my feet?”

 

“Just the basics, Buck. I can do the, uh—rock step? I can do triple-step and, oh, I know the ‘skin the cat’ move. That one’s fun.” Steve went from sheepish to eager so fast it gave Bucky whiplash. Or, Bucky used whiplash as an excuse for ducking his head, hiding his ridiculously sappy smile.

 

“An’ where’dya learn all this, Rogers? You holdin’ out on me?”

 

“Shut up. It’s called a surprise, you jerk.”

 

Bucky fiddled around, having to find the right song. It was one of the last. He let the needle settle on half-way through _My Romance._

 

“You sap,” Steve said.

 

“Jesus, can’t you shut your trap? I’m tryin’ to have a moment here.”

 

“You’re—I was the one tryin’ to make a moment!”

 

“Yeah, well I stole it, so shush.” Bucky cleared his throat, a little offended at himself for being the nervous one now. Licking his lips he said, “Okay, so I wanna do all the fast stuff and fun ones—I want to twirl you and pick ya up and teach you all the hard moves, the silly ones, kicking our legs out,” Bucky didn’t know where all this was pouring from, “and go dancing out somewhere. But I, uh. Fuck, did I really used to be good with words? Fuck.” Sometimes, actions went better than words. “I just... c’mere you fuckin’ mook. Step on my feet.”

 

“Buck—”

 

“I can take your skinny ass. Now hurry up, the song’s gonna start.”

 

“Alright, alright,” Steve grumbled, clutching Bucky’s shoulders as he stepped up. Steve gave a playful squeeze and Bucky made an exaggerated _oof_ at Steve’s weight.

 

_It seems we stood and talked like this before._ Steve’s face turned all mushy and Bucky adjusted their hands, slowly moving his feet to the gentle music. Steve’s heels didn’t fit on Bucky’s feet, so he helped with stepping. _The smile you are smiling you were smiling then._

 

“Ya know I _can_ dance,” Steve mumbled, but didn’t make a move to get off Bucky’s feet.

 

“I always wanted to show you how...back then, y’know,” Bucky confessed. “Hoped to hold ya, tell you I was doin’ it so ya knew how to handle the girls. ‘Course I’d have to show you how to lead but I think I coulda convinced ya to forget and let me lead...And I’d be all jealous,” Bucky half-smiled, “thinkin’ of you dancin’ with these other girls…”

 

Steve brushed his lips over Bucky’s cheek, catching on the stubble. Kissed him on the lips, a soft pressure, a warm and sweet type of loving. Bucky parted his lips a little and nipped at Steve’s bottom lip before pulling back. They pressed cheek to cheek, swaying slower. Bucky always thought Steve would have been the perfect dance partner way back when he was a small little thing. But he thought maybe...maybe they fit better like this, big and bulky as they were.

 

“Stop thinkin’,” Steve grumbled and God, Bucky loved him so fucking much. The song was ending and he closed his eyes, smushing his cheek harder to Steve’s, listening.

 

_And so it seems that we have met before_

 

_And laughed before, and loved before_

 

_But who knows where or when?_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! The first song at the end is Runaround Sue by Dion and the second is Where or When, sung by Ella Fitzgerald.
> 
> You can find me on tumblr @ [feedmethehellagay](http://feedmethehellagay.tumblr.com/)
> 
> A great big thanks once again to debwalsh for the art!


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